Lots of updating to do!!

Hello everyone!!

I'm sorry that I didn't blog yesterday, as promised. I had to work and didn't realise I would be there all day!!
I arrived home at 11pm and decided it was too late to be sitting infront of a laptop!

Last time I posted it was New Years Eve, the very last few hours of 2011. The year of 2011 brought me some laughs and some fabulous memories - like going on holiday to Cromer with two of my friends, Macky and Harry.

And also recieving a big, brand new dolls house for Christmas... yes, I forgot to blog about this one! Oops! Well here it is! All 8 rooms of it (excluding hallways), all 9 sash windows and all working doors!

These photos really dont show you the true size of this house, it's massive! And takes up a lot of room! Hehe. I'm not entirely sure what I would like to do with this house yet. It's supposed to be a mother and daughter project, but things are still pretty  hectic. Getting my mom to sit down and discuss it with me is out of the question until the kids are back to school, dad's back to work and we can go back to our lazy days sat on the sofa catching up with Holby City! :D

So more on this in time.

Now, as I promised on New Years Eve, I would like to list my goals for the year to come. I didn't want to set any New Years Resolutions, because, when you're honest with yourself, how many did you actually keep from last year? I remember my New Year's Resolutions was to lose a bit of weight, be healthier, exercise more and save money. I saved my money until I had to pay for my car insurance. I lost a bit of weight and I'm not very happy with my shape and size, but I still eat junk food and I still eat like a horse. I don't excerise, but I consider work to be enough of that, as I work on a bar and I walk around it countless times a day.

So this year I am setting Goals. These Goals, I will make a special new post for, and will keep it updated as I complete them. I haven't yet thought of the realistic goals I know I can work to achieve. We are only on Day 2 of 2012, I still have 363 days to complete my goals, when I finalise them on this blog!

Check back tomorrow, or maybe even later tonight, hopefully I'll have my list up by then!

Have a lovely day/night!

Hugs
xx

Preparing For Christmas, Already!

Over the past couple of weeks, I have started my preparations for Christmas, in miniature scale!
My Etsy shop (Diddies) has been empty and closed for quite some time! At last, I have re-opened and I thought I would share with you what I have been up to!

I absolutely adore this prep. board. I spent days making, and remaking, most of what you see here. The first board I made, I decided was too big. The pastry was then the wrong colour. I didn't like the look of the mince meat I made. The colours of the book weren't clear enough, and then I kept ripping the flour bag. In the end, I think I came out on top with a gorgeous little mince pie prep. board that I am so proud of!

I hope you like it! :)

Next up I decided to make some cookies. I had a bit of practise with making cookies last Christmas, but this time around I think I've really improved! I love the little gingerbread men and the candy cane really finishes off this plate!

More Gingerbread Men!! :)

Hehe, these were so much fun to make! I made lots of mince pies with the intention of displaying them on this plate, to go as a possible set with the other two. I had a bit of mince meat and pastry coloured clay left over from the prep. board, so I decided to add a bitten into mince pie. I coloured these with chalks and watery paint and I think the effects are wonderful! I adore this item, I hope you do too! :)

Now I'm all Christmas-ed out this week, so I'm going to get back to the bakery and get some progress made there!

Have a great day everyone!

ShellbyFay

HELLO!!

Hello everyone!
I hope you are all well, happy and are getting on brilliantly within the mini-ing world.
I apologise for my extremely long absense. I've been so busy finishing college (qualified at last!) and I have also moved bedrooms!

If you can remember my last post was about the moving of The Olde Post Office to the annex and the extreme lack of space in my bedroom. Well now I have moved bedrooms, to the biggest bedroom in the house! I have tons of room for dolls house, I could buy hundreds more now - and I have a balcony to fill if I wanted to!

I'm unable to post any photos at the moment, but I am quite eager to show you photos of the move around and then shortly to follow there should be some more progress posts on Bruion and The Bakery when I finally get round to spending some time on these projects! :)

Bye for now!

It's been so long!!

Hello everyone!
Blimey, it's been a while, has it not?! I'm sorry I haven't been here for a while, but real life has been getting in the way pretty badly just recently. Hopefully this weekend I've found myself some time to get some mini-ing done as I'm missing it so much!
I have a couple of things to show you this morning.

A few weeks ago I was making a trap door for the inside of Bruion. Making the trap door was simple enough, and if you would like a tutorial posting up on how I made this - just let me know! It's pretty self explanatory though by the photos.
Glueing the door into place, however, was the most tedious task going! I had to hold it in place for hours on end while the wood dried to the flooring and the string dried to the sides. If I moved just slightly, the glue untacked and I had to start all over! Eventually, I managed to find something that would hold it in place and it's been left like that for about a week. It's well and truly stuck now! Here's a few photos for you.

                                      

Please forgive the bad lighting!

 Those hoop hooks? Yes - there's another little something I'm in the process of making. I've made it once already, but I'm not happy with a part of it, so I need to tweak it until I'm happy. Then I can show you what the hoop hooks are for!





So anyways, in my depressed state last night - having finally snapped and deciding to forget real life and college for just a couple of hours, I went ahead and made a start of the "grass" effect for the downstairs of Bruion. Here's a photo:

As you can see, I've finished painting the stones and I've added some stepping stones and random stones here and there. I still need to add a second layer of "grass" to thicken it up a bit but I'll get that done this weekend at some point, hopefully!

So there we have it. You now know I haven't dropped off the face of the Earth! I'm still mini-ing and I'm still making progress.. just slowly! Hopefully, I'll be back later on to show you some more progress!

Also - I still have my 20% discount going at Diddies! :D

Have a good day!!

Progress On Bruion!

Hey everyone!!

I hope you've all had a good week and a constructive weekend!
I've been extremely busy this week with college work, hense why there's been no progress to post up... up until tonight!

Today I had a bit of a wobble over the brick work on the bakery. Thankfully, yet again the lovely folk on the DHE forum helped me see that the brickwork was authentic, and they told me to stop expecting perfect.. not in those words, but it was a general hint in some of the posts! So I soldiered on with the stencilling and now leaving the brick work to dry over night, ready for sanding and finishing tomorrow. So I wont show you now, as it doesn't look anything special, but I will show you hopefully tomorrow if all goes to plan!

Now onto the real reason for this post... Bruion. I've finished the painting on the inside, and outside. So today, while I can't do much else on the bakery, I decided to glue on the beams.

Here's what it looks like so far on the outside:

Ignore the gaps in the mossy roof... I have to buy some more mossy stuff to finish off the otherside of the roof and then I can fill in the gaps. Looking pretty good so far is it not? :D

Well, considering I was on a roll... I decided to go ahead and make something else. Now you all know I am terrible with wood, but I just about managed to make some windowsills. They were easy to make and took about 5 minutes! Fabulous stuff :D

Here's some photos of how they turned out:

You'll have to excuse my dad there! hehe

I'm currently making something else wooden. Considering I'm on a roll tonight, why stop? I might just carry on until I have no wood left!

See you tomorrow

Bits of progress, here and there.

Hi everyone!

Okay so it was Tuesday since I last posted. That's so long ago! And I have to be honest, not an awful lot has happened since then.
I'm still poorly with the cold. I've been sneezing and blowing my nose a lot today, so I think I'm starting to get it out of my system. Yay! Kind of wish my nose was a body part I could de-attach and leave somewhere while I worked... but then I'd lose it and look pretty strange for a while...

Anyways, enough of that. In between studying, sneezing, sleeping and sniffing Olbas oil - I've been doing just odd bits of work on The Bakers Dozen and Bruion. Not an awful lot, but every little helps - or so Tesco says.

I've been painting the outside of The Bakers Dozen gray, ready to do the brick stencilling. It still needs a second coat, but I can do that in the morning. I've also painted the inside of the extentsion. Here's a photo:

 The Georgian's didn't have many colours, not until the Regency times anyway. I found this shade of colour on a website that showed you different colours the Georgian's had. I thought this would look good in the bakery part. It's a colour that will open the room up a bit, as it isn't very big. Everytime I think about furniture, I have to remind myself it's not as big as The Olde Post Office kitchen. I really like this colour, although in some lights it can look too pinky. It's a homebase brand tester post (I never get the big tins or the expensive stuff!) and I think it's called Ballet. I might have to dirty the colour up a bit as I go along with the project, I don't want it to look too new and fresh.

Last night I painted the roof of Bruion. I've had a change of plan. My original idea was to thatch the roof, but during my research, getting some inspiration, I came across a few fairy dwellings that had mossy roof's. I've been doing that staring thing again. Looking at Bruion with unusually wide eyes while my tea gets cold and I've decided Bruion would look a lot better with a mossy roof. It would look more woodlandy I think... I hope anyway.

Here's the painted roof photo:

This colour is a Wilkinson's tester pot and it's called Oak Leaf. I usually use Wilkinson's colours and they are so unbelievably cheap and I'm usually in that area of town. This is actually a really lovely colour. I'm not usually a fan of green, but this colour is very calm and pretty.

Tonight I grabbed the bag of moss I found in Homebase and thought about sticking it to the roof. Only problem was, the moss was more like thin string. No. Didn't like it. So I put it back in the bag, gave it to mom as a late Christmas present (not that she appreciated it much) and dug out some other stuff I'd bought to use as grass for the downstairs part. Here's a photo:

Much better! The box I had filled just under half of the roof space and I pulled it apart and did it bit by bit. I'm really pleased with the effect so I've sent my mom to the model shop tomorrow to buy some more. This stuff is actually used for bushes on railway models. My brother got a model trainset for Christmas. I took him to the model shop to spend his Christmas money and found this. I don't think it'll make good grass though, looks a bit thick. But it's perfect for the mossy look! What do you think?

Tomorrow, I hope to get the rest of the roof done, and the second coat of gray paint on The Bakers Dozen.

See you tomorrow!

Brick Work Completed On The Bakers Dozen Extension

Hi everyone!

Today, I've been working super hard to get the brick work finished on the extension to The Bakers Dozen! I'm really pleased with it so far, as it was my first attempt at using the brick stencils from The Brompley Craft Products supplier. I used their flemish bond stencil and their red brick compound. It's come out beautifully.

Here's a photo of what it looks like now:

The window and door is not glued into place yet as I still have to paint them. I placed them in just to give you, as well as myself, a general idea. These will be painted white. I also placed the roof on to give another general idea. I'm going to be applying roof slates to this so hopefully this part of the bakery is going to look pretty swish.

Over the next couple of nights I'm going to be painting the rest of the bakery outside grey, ready to do the brick work on it on Friday. I'm also going to paint inside this part of the bakery if I get the time to do so.

Hopefully, if college work is kind to me, I'll be able to add some tiles or wood flooring to this building at the weekend!

I'm at college on Wednesday's and Thursday's, so I only have time to do mini work in the evenings. I'm suffering from the cold that's going around and the nights are dark; living in a cottage you can understand lighting isn't always great. So please bare with me!

Fingers crossed, I'll be back tomorrow!
Good night
xx

Good Evening Everyone

Today, I had the chance to show you lots of pictures. Pictures including the new Etsy item that will be listed within a few days, the progress I made on The Bakers Dozen and a few idea's I've come about for Bruion. But, I've decided to change my plans a smidge.

My blog is going to undergo a small make-over. You may not even notice it unless you visit every single day, but I'm making a lot of changes for the New Year. My Etsy shop, Diddies, will be going under a small make-over too! :D

So I apologise for not showing you any photo's today, I promise there will be an exciting blog post for you all tomorrow!

See you tomorrow!

The Enchantment, progress!!

Hello again everyone!

As promised, piccies!!
Today I went to town and picked up a few supplies that I was needing over the next couple of days. Came home and did nothing but painting and staining! Here's the result:

I apologise that you can't see the true colours very well. I will take the next lot of pictures in the day light tomorrow so you can see more clearly. If you click on the photo, it'll bring it up a bit bigger and it's a bit clearer to see the colours.

I wanted to get the outside beams put on, but it got too late. The windows are taped up so I didn't get paint on the inside, I'm very clumsy with paint!

Tomorrow I plan on painting the inside, adding the beams and hopefully I might be able to do the downstairs area.

I hope you like the progress so far, I'm sorry it's a very short post but it's late now and I'm very tired!

See you tomorrow! :)

Progress Made on The Market Cross, plus new name revealed!

Good morning everyone!
I have an apology to make. I promised you that I would show you the progress I made yesterday, but my camera died and I couldn't find the battery charger. This morning, before doing anything else I found that charger, allowed the battery to charge for all of 2 minutes - just enough to snap up a couple of photo's for you!

Yesterday, Thomas and I got the room piece all glued together. It looks fab now! Here is the building all standing and looking fab. I'm yet to put all the beams around the outside on, but I'm going to do that after I've painted it.

I put some wooden flooring inside the room yesterday too. This was very quick and easy! Still needs sanding down to neaten the edges a bit, but I'll do that today!

Over the past few days I've been thinking about what to call this project. I don't like calling it "The Market Cross" or "MC". The lovely people on the DHE forum have been helping me think up some ideas. So far we've only got The Enchantment. Thank you Joe for your suggestion!

I was thinking long and hard about it last night, and I really think The Enchantment will work! So there we go. I'll hopefully be back later with some more progress made on The Enchantment!

See you tonight!

Diddies @ Etsy

Hello everyone!
I hope you're all good and you're all prepared for Christmas! Only 8 more sleeps to go... well for those who live in the UK anyways!

I've dropped by today for a couple of reasons. By the time Christmas comes around I'm going to be so busy, and you'll read why in just a moment, that I'll not have an awful lot of time to post much for a while.

The first thing I'm going to tell you, is that I've opened up an Etsy shop. It's called Diddies. So far there's only 3 items you can choose from (I have more than one of each!) so I definately have to make some more items, but I finished college yesterday, which means up until Christmas day I'll have time to make new mini's to put up, so keep checking back if nothing there takes your fancy. :) In the shop right now I have some Profiteroles and a selection of 2 different batches of donuts, one set is 4 brightly coloured donuts and the other set is 4 brightly coloured donuts, 2 chocolate eclairs and 2 chocolate buns.



My second bit of news is this: The Market Cross. Yup, that's my third project, well a picture of it. My grandparents have kindly bought me this property as a Christmas present. I can't tell you just how excited I am! I've got plans for this property, but you'll have to wait and see what those plans are!

Also, I big welcome to all my new followers! Thank you for following my blog, I very much appreciate it :)

Anyways, I've got to dash now, sorry this was a pretty short post.
I'll be back soon!!

Happy Mini-ing
ShellbyFay
x

Back From The Fair, With Goodies!!

Well good afternoon!!
Hope you're all okay and having a good Sunday!

Today was the fair in Woodhall, I call it Petwood but it's actually Lyndsey Fairs. I call it Petwood because it's held at the Petwood Hotel.

Anyways, enough rambling - here's some photos of the goodies I picked up!

I've split them into 3 different photos.

The first photo shows items I've bought that are purely for creative purposes. I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do with these things yet, but they were bargains so I grabbed them quick!

The second photo shows items that I've bought to finish The Olde Post Office. The post office is not completely finished, I'm still buying odd bits and bobs. It's slow work, the finishing touches, but these little bits were perfect and they were also bargains, so I grabbed them before anyone else could! There's also some glittery pipe cleaners there that I will use as tinsel for the Christmas tree when I start decorating the house for Christmas!

The last photo, the exciting one! I always save the best till last.. Items I've bought for the bakery! The image shows the tiles that'll I'll be using on the roof, the alley and inside the bakery. There is also a few bits there that I just had to have because I thought they looked great! I adore the little bread pot!!

So there we go, my new treasures. I'm going to dash off now to generate some ideas for what to use the creative items for, and I am going to give these new items a home!!

Happy Mini-ing!!
ShellbyFay
xx

Extension Finished!!

Good evening everyone!
It snowed. Humph! (I'm not a fan of the snow to be honest.) Everyone else seems to have snow, and I was kind of hoping we wouldn't have any snow for quite a while... but nope, the weather man predicted snow, we got snow. Grrr!
I planned on taking a drive to a dolls house shop I've found that's not too far away from where I live, but I've only been passed my driving test for 3 weeks, or about that, anyways, and so didnt fancy a drive in the snow to somewhere I've never been before...

Not all bad though, this snow business...

I convinced my dad to get the extension to the bakery finished..!!! (This is where I stop rambling on about snow and get down to the dolls house bit!)

After a few moans, grumbles, coffee's and head scratching he came up with this::

(Click the photos to see them larger!)

Now please, bare in mind this is the first dolls house related piece of woodwork my dad has ever done. He didn't have any fancy tools. Had no real idea of what he was doing, just my word for it. And ta da! It now has a door, a door I can open to get into and the roof is stuck on, but comes off! I'm thrilled to bits with it!!!

Today, I also realised that I went ahead and showed you photos of the new extension a little while ago without telling you what it was or why I was doing it... Bad huh?

Okay, I'll come clean and explain everything now. Well this part is going onto the back of the Bakers Dozen. The room part is going to be the actual bakery. The bit that just looks like my dad forgot to cut it off, will be a dirty, back alley which I'm just going to have a lot of fun with. I've not researched what Georgian alleys would've been like, so this will be my personal touch.

That leaves the orginal building empty, not for long though! This part will be the shop floor and the inside tea room.

Adding the extension gives me that bit of extra space to work with and means I can cram all my ideas into this project without having to hang most of the furniture from the ceiling and pretending the Georgians could fly...


So I hope you all like the progress so far, it's slow, but steady. I'm going to a dolls house fair tomorrow so I plan on picking up a few bits to start the messy work on the bakery next weekend!

Happy mini-ing
ShellbyFay
xx

The Building Work Has Begun!

So, as promised, this weekend the building work for The Bakers Dozen, has started. My dad and I drew out the templates on paper, for all the different pieces of the building. Then copied the templates onto the MDF. Then my dad cut all the pieces out individually and made sure they all fitted and matched.

And this was the result:

It's not all glued together and it doesn't have a door in it yet, we're still discussing what wall will open out and whether or not the roof will come apart, and then there's the "which door!?!?" issue - too many to choose from! Haha.

So there we go, work has officially started on The Bakers Dozen and next weekend, hopefully, the building work will be completed and I can get started on the interior and exterior decorating!

A very quick post!

Okay, first of all I have a some apologies to make.
First - I am very behind on the welcomes, I must remember to do these soon, but welcome to all of my new followers! I have had a nosey at your blogs and I very much enjoyed them all. I will have a better look at them when I have more time, and therefore give you a better welcome. :)

Second - I know I'm one of those people who post nearly every day, it is the college holidays and I have had heaps of time to concentrate on my miniatures, but there have been a number of real life issues that have side tracked me from posting up and updates recently.

But I have one for you today. Photos of the progress so far on my dolls houses :)

The kitchen is cluttered now with new buys from the fair and it's crying out for the stairs to be installed. The living room has some candles waiting to be placed out and wine bottles are in need of a stand too. Skip there is posing for the photo! And up in the master bedroom - some new carpet :) and some candles and some perfume bottles need putting into place also.

There's more on the shop below this photo. So moving upstairs we have the study, which as you can see still has no furniture! Grrr. The door I bought at the fair still needs to be painted and fitted. The bathroom is looking pretty bare. I need to make that room a little more 'lived in.' And up stairs we have the children's bedroom. I took the carpet out of the master bedroom and put it in here because I thought it would look nicer here. As you can see there is a big mess on the floor - children aye! No, this is me :( I will tidy this up soon, I pinky promise.

Now onto the most exciting bit!

Malcom was so excited about all his new shop furniture he had to get inside quickly for this photo! Penny the post lady claim's she more mature, and would rather all this 'mess' on the floor was cleaned up first before she set foot in the shop. Malcom doesn't call this 'mess' he calls it 'work in progress!' But the shop furniture arrived this morning, I've been staining it all afternoon. Look's alright I think :) Although the post office counters are a different colour - but Malcom say's they are new installments and I say these were bought this colour.